ChainCatcher news, according to CoinDesk, Bitcoin developer Robin Linus proposed a theoretical method last year to make the Bitcoin blockchain more programmable. Now, he's launching a second iteration called "BitVM2," which it says offers significant improvements that could bring the concept closer to real-world deployments. The project will rely on advanced cryptography and innovative design to build a secure "bridge" to move Bitcoin from the main network to a secondary network known as a "rollup."
According to the white paper released this week by Linus and five co-authors, the basic setup involves using cryptography to compress programs into subroutines, which are then executed in Bitcoin transactions. Afterwards, these programs are "verified" in three on-chain transactions, essentially ensuring that no one is trying to cheat or steal. In previous versions, verification could take up to 70 transactions, according to one of the co-authors, Alexei Zamyatin, who is reportedly working separately for the Bitcoin L2 network Build on Bitcoin (BOB).
A key improvement in the new version is that anyone can challenge suspicious transactions, a feature called "permissionless challenges." The original BitVM was released in October last year but never really saw any real deployment, with only a fixed set of operators able to issue challenges.
“This design gives us these major improvements,” Zamyatin said in a video interview. “We now have a complete and comprehensive description of the BitVM paradigm.”
